Tuesday, October 03, 2006

Fear and Smear

I got this piece of junk mail today. Isn't it clever? Putting "Don't Let Them Win" between a picture of an obvious terrorist and a picture of recognizable Democrats (plus Michael Moore, to increase the guilt-by-association factor), to convey the not-so-subliminable message that Democrats are terrorists.
On the back is this WARNING, in screaming red: "When Michigan Republicans don't vote... Bad things happen."
Totally missing from the brochure is any information about the Republican candidates, The brochure includes no reason to vote for the Republicans, only a plea that they need Michigan Republicans' votes in order to defeat the Democrats.
What this tells me is that the Republican Party can't think of anything good to say about its own candidates. And if there's nothing good that even their own party can say about them, why should anybody vote for them?

I especially liked the one about the Michigan economy. Put some dates on the graph, and the high point would read, "Bill Clinton leaves office. George Bush selected president." The low point, well, as long as the Republicans are in charge, we haven't seen it yet.

Michigan's unemployment rate is 7.1%, the second-highest in the country. The Republicans, of course, are blaming Gov. Granholm. The Republicans, of course, are ignoring the effect of Bushonomics, magnified by the mess that is the American auto industry. They are also ignoring the fact that Gov. Granholm's predecessor, the odious John Engler, played the usual Republican dirty trick of planting a time bomb in the state budget that only went off after he left office.

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